The present invention relates to breeding of plants and more particularly to plants breeding based on tissue culture cells or callus (hereinafter referred to as "callus") which are allowed to develop on a nutrient substrate, generally known as agar-agar.
The development of plant precursor on agar-agar base has rapidly increased, since found as the most effective way of plant cultivation, particularly due to the high yield (plants per area unit) that can be reached--in contradistinction to soil seed growing methods.
However, such callus growing, under laboratory conditions, usually in test-tubes, bottles or similar containers, is disagreeable from the following aspects: The development of a plant, by its very nature, suffers if its surrounding is confined by partitions of any kind (impeding free growth in all directions; the "shadowing effect" of such partitions; and finally, the need to apply mechanical means (by the use of tweezers and the like) for extracting the plant for further cultivation thereof, usually re-planting thereof in seedling or transplantation trays. It is well-known that plants, at this early stage of their life, are most vulnerable so that transportation from one environment to another could be traumatic and therefore must be carried out with utmost care.
Various attempts have been proposed to partly solve this problem (see for example U.S. Pat. No. 4,620,390 to the present Applicant which is brought as general background).
It is thus the general object of the invention to provide a method of plants development ensuring, on the one hand, the free and unimpeded development of the callus in all directions and, on the other hand, the quick, convenient and least harmful translocation of the plants.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a method whereby the handling of the plants is effected without human touch, and which is readily performed by automatic means.
It is a still further object of the invention to provide a receptacle readily useful for carrying out the method of the present invention.